1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a multi-function facsimile apparatus connectible to computers and communication lines, and more particularly to a facsimile apparatus capable of using data from computers for printing and facsimile communications.
2. Description of the Prior Art
An example of prior art multi-function facsimile apparatuses connectible to computers is disclosed in Japanese Patent laid-open publication HEI 1(1989)-238366. This facsimile apparatus is constructed with an interface connected to a host computer, a printer emulator, a facsimile communication control circuit and an image scanner. The printer emulator receives data from the host computer via the interface, and converts the received data into dot data according to a print instruction code from the computer to form data capable of being faxed. The data from the printer emulator is faxed to the address under control of a given facsimile communication control circuit. When a document is read with an image scanner, the read data is faxed to the given address through the facsimile communication control circuit.
However, regarding the above type of facsimile machine, there has not been given any description as to control for temporarily and individually storing data from the host computer and data received from a facsimile apparatus at the other end, in a memory or other storage circuit, and then recording and outputting the data to a common recorder circuit.
In addition, Japanese Patent laid-open publication HEI 1(1989)-293063 describes a multimedia communication system constructed by connecting a personal computer (hereunder abbreviated to "PC") with a facsimile apparatus. Referring to FIG. 1, a communication control circuit 100 of the multimedia communication system is connected to a PC 200 and a facsimile apparatus 300. A PC communication control section 101 transfers text data from the PC 200 to a mail data section 102a or a text data section 102b of a file memory 102. A facsimile communication control section 103 transfers image data from a facsimile apparatus 300 to an image data section 102c of the file memory 102. A common service section 104 controls the file memory 102, and manages the image data, the text data and the mail data. A mail box circuit 105 manages the mail data section 102a, and controls transmission and reception of the mail data.
When the text data from the PC 200 is being transmitted to the facsimile apparatus 300, the common service section 104 reads the text data stored in the text data section 102b to transfer it to the facsimile communication control section 103. The facsimile communication control section 103 then converts the text data to image data as dot data which is transmitted to the facsimile apparatus 300 according to a facsimile communication protocol. The mail data stored in the mail data section 102a may also be transmitted to other PCs and the facsimile apparatus 300.
With the multimedia communication system illustrated in FIG. 1, however, the data managed by the common service section 104 are the text data or mail data from the PC 200, and the image data from the facsimile apparatus 300 which are information in different formats. Accordingly, the file memory 102 has completely isolated storage areas for the image data and the text data, and this results in complicated management required for each data. An additional drawback of the prior art is an increased capacity required for the file memory 102 in cases where a large volume of text data or image data is being stored in the file memory 102.